An expatriate lab technician at the Indira Gandhi Memorial Hospital (IGMH) responsible for the transfusion of HIV positive blood to a pregnant Maldivian patient has been taken into police custody on Thursday night (February 27).
IGMH Deputy CEO Dr Mohamed Habeeb told MPs on the government oversight committee yesterday that the Indian national had admitted his culpability in the incident.
Local media has since revealed his identity and reported that the Criminal Court has extended pretrial detention to seven days.
Habeeb was summoned to the oversight committee along with Health Minister Dr Mariyam Shakeela and senior officials at the ministry.
Briefing MPs on the incident, Habeeb explained that the blood test was done on February 2 and the transfusion took place the next day.
The technician at fault reported the blood as negative despite the machine showing that it was positive for HIV.
The error was discovered when the patient came in for a routine checkup on February 18, he continued, after which the blood test report was reviewed.
A high-level meeting with senior officials from the Health Ministry was held immediately after the discovery and a three-member committee was formed to look into the incident, he said.
The committee comprised of an experienced doctor, senior nurse, and retired lab technician, he added – none of whom were employed by the hospital.
The incident was revealed to the media hours after the committee shared its findings, he said.
The blood sample was taken from a donor found by the patient and not from the hospital’s blood bank, Habeeb stressed. The donor was not previously registered as an HIV patient.
While there were normally two technicians at the lab, Habeeb noted that the Indian national was alone on the day in question as it was a public holiday.
Habeeb revealed that the technician left for India on the day of the incident and returned to the Maldives about two days later.
The technician had been working at the hospital for seven years and had recently received an award for his performance, Habeeb said.
However, Permanent Secretary at the Health Ministry Geela Ali revealed that the technician had been fired from his previous job in 2006.
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It seems that this guy was doing a OK job there and might have been given "cash" to carry out this horrid action.
This was not an accident and he had forged the report to ensure that the patient gets this infested blood to create the news headline.
Maldivains should be realistic and pragmatic and be on the watch in dealing with South Asians.
Mind you, it is a big business in some neighbouring countries to remove and sell human organs.
Maldies should know who you are dealing with.
He was a crook who was dismissed for carelessness and and various other problems..and you say he is an OK guy?? yeah right! People like him will be ok in the PPM years I guess...can kill off all the Maldivians so that all the money can go into the pockets of the those who obey Maumoon kalaange!
http://www.sun.mv/39247/
Nahid. So far it seems that he was paid to do this task ? What good it has for PPM nothing ?
What benefit it has for MDP ? Huge, .
Think it over
In general - the whole system of public health and safety is questionable.
To my opinion, a health reform is much needed. This to ensure availability to provide proper health services as well as the quality of those services.
This should be higher on every politicians agenda - to ensure proper and quality of health services to the Maldivians.
when peanuts are paid only crooks and imbeciles apply
please don't draw out unnecessary conclusion, he is a different national Propably someone is trapping him for others mistake. And ighms is stating they have state of art laboratory but strongly doubt that, they are not even supply protective lead apron for orthopedic surgeries.And that is cheap considering the cost of single surgery. so who is blaming who?
it is absolutely a human error..n the technician was one of the best staff in igmh lab..even he got award also...n none from igmh never do it purposely...